8,000 families expected at Thanksgiving Blessing event today

Duke Green moves a pallet full of apples as volunteers prepared for the upcoming Thanksgiving Blessing Project at the Mt. View Community Center on Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013. Thousands of people in need will be able to celebrate the holiday with a turkey and all the fixings as a result of the partnership between the Food Bank of Alaska and the faith-based community distributing food at seven sites in Anchorage on Monday from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Quentin Caswell sets out canned green beans as volunteers prepared for the upcoming Thanksgiving Blessing Project at the Mt. View Community Center on Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013. Thousands of people in need will be able to celebrate the holiday with a turkey and all the fixings as a result of the partnership between the Food Bank of Alaska and the faith-based community distributing food at seven sites in Anchorage on Monday from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m.

A youth group from Anchorage Grace Church bagged apples at the Mt. View Community Center on Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013, as volunteers prepared for the upcoming Thanksgiving Blessing Project. Thousands of people will be able to celebrate the holiday with a turkey and all the fixings as a result of the partnership by the Food Bank of Alaska and the faith-based community distributing food to those in need at seven sites in Anchorage on Monday from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Duke Green, left, and Martin King help unload food from a New Hope delivery truck as volunteers prepared for the upcoming Thanksgiving Blessing Project at the Mt. View Community Center on Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013. Thousands of people in need will be able to celebrate the holiday with a turkey and all the fixings as a result of a partnership between the Food Bank of Alaska and the faith-based community to distribute food at seven sites in Anchorage on Monday from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Jillian Caswell stacked canned corn as volunteers prepared for the upcoming Thanksgiving Blessing Project at the Mt. View Community Center on Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013. Thousands of people will be able to celebrate the holiday with a turkey and all the fixings as a result of the partnership by the Food Bank of Alaska and the faith-based community distributing food to those in need at seven sites in Anchorage on Monday from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Bill Roth

On Monday, the annual Thanksgiving Blessing will offer an estimated 8,000 Anchorage families the groceries to make a traditional Thanksgiving meal at home, turkey and pumpkin pie included, for free.

On Sunday night in the gym at the Mountain View Community Center, volunteers put the finishing touches on the spread.

There were mountains of potatoes and pyramids of canned cranberry sauce and somewhere, thousands of frozen turkeys waiting to go home with families for their big moment on Thursday.

There's more need than ever.

At the Mountain View site alone, 1,900 families are expected.

Churches and businesses from all over Anchorage donate food, supplies and time.

"There are hundreds, probably thousands, of volunteers," said Karla Jurzi of the Food Bank of Alaska, which has coordinated the event since 2004.

When Mountain View site coordinator Eileen Starr first volunteered eight years ago, only 600 families showed up there.

Overall, about 10 percent more meals will be given away this year, said Jurzi.

"There are a lot of people in Anchorage living on the edge," she said. "If one little thing goes wrong -- a car breaks, rent goes up -- they are in trouble for that month."

In Mountain View, families start lining up at noon, an hour before doors open, Jurzi said. The line winds through the building and out the door.

They get potatoes, canned vegetables, gravy mix, a pumpkin pie, rolls, cranberry sauce and a turkey and roasting pan, among other fixings.